Palladio is the reason most people know the Veneto's villas, and this was one of his first. Villa Gazzotti Grimani stands at Bertesina, just west of Vicenza on the edge of the flat plain, and dates from the early 1540s, when Andrea Palladio was still a stonemason's apprentice turned architect, not yet the man whose Four Books would shape buildings from Virginia to St Petersburg. It was designed for the Gazzotti family and later passed to the Grimani, whose name remained attached. The plan is bold: a centre block with a loggia stacked above a loggia, and a pair of wings that were meant to curve forward but were never completed.
It feels more like a farmhouse that has been given an idea than a palace, and that is the charm. These villas were working estates, grain and wine and silk, and the great hall was where the landowner did business. Palladio's trick was to dress the barn in the clothes of a Roman temple, and the whole area has been protected as a UNESCO site, the City of Vicenza and the Palladian Villas of the Veneto, since the 1990s.
The riding around here is gentle and honestly not the main attraction. The land is flat, ruled by drainage ditches, poplars and maize fields, and the lanes between Bertesina, Quinto Vicentino and Lisiera are narrow with a lot of tractors and cyclists. The better rewards lie to the north and west, where the Berici hills and then the Asiago plateau begin to climb. In winter, fog can lie thick on the plain for days, and in July the air is heavy enough to feel in your helmet.
Fuel and food are no problem. Vicenza, a city of more than a hundred thousand, is only a few kilometres away, and the old centre is full of Palladio's palaces on the Corso, along with excellent cooking. Try baccalà alla vicentina, the stockfish stewed slowly in milk, which locals defend as fiercely as their football team.
Early or late in the day the stone takes a warm colour from the low sun, and the grass in front is often empty. Tread carefully on the gravel, and check before you go whether the villa is open, since private use and restoration affect visiting.